On September 28, 2022, Hurricane Ian made landfall as a high-end category 4 storm in Southwest Florida, tying for the fifth-strongest hurricane to strike the continental United States. The storm posed great uncertainty to the state of Florida, yet MQA remained equipped to prepare health care practitioners with timely information and quality licensure services against an emerging public health threat. MQA leveraged its partnerships with health care practitioners, associations, and regulatory boards and councils to deliver urgent notifications about emergency directives affecting professions via mass email communications, web-based alerts, and realtime chat services. This communication empowered health care practitioners with the information needed to continue serving on the frontlines and provided health care consumers with the resources needed to ensure health and well-being during the event. Realizing the immediate need to mobilize medical personnel to areas devastated by Hurricane Ian, the Department joined forces with Volunteer Florida to promote an online portal for licensed health care practitioners, both in-state and out-of-state, to volunteer expertise, skills, and time in areas impacted by Hurricane Ian. As a result, over 34,000 practitioners who indicated a willingness to serve in a disaster or emergency were more readily positioned to deploy through a trusted organization in an organized and tactical manner. MQA also deployed nearly 10% of its workforce and redirected resources to maintain critical licensure processes. Teams concentrated efforts to drastically reduce the time to license practitioners of emergent professions, such as nurses, emergency medical services, and mental health practitioners. The Board of Nursing was one unit that demonstrated this commitment to reducing processing times, as associated initial applications were processed in under 24 hours. Hurricane Ian Response Efforts September - October 2022 The storm posed great uncertainty to the state of Florida, yet MQA remained equipped to prepare health care practitioners with timely information and quality licensure services... " MEDICAL QUALITY ASSURANCE | FY 2022-23 QUARTERLY PERFORMANCE REPORT 2 07
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